Sending money to help your child illegally cross the border into the United States means that you lack “good moral character” in the eyes of the Board of Immigration Appeals

The Fourth Circuit today denied a petition for review of a decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals denying cancellation of removal to two Guatemalan parents classified as alien smugglers for facilitating the illegal entry of their four children into the United States. Judge Wilkinson wrote the published opinion in Ramos v. Holder, which was joined in by Judges Wynn and Floyd. The opinion begins as follows:

Ricardo Paz Ramos entered the United States illegally from Guatemala in 1989, and his wife Berta and their four children followed. Each child’s arrival in the United States involved asimilar sequence of events—Ricardo and Berta sent several thousand dollars to the child at a hotel in Mexico, who arrived illegally in the United States promptly thereafter. The Immigration Judge (“IJ”) and Board of Immigration Appeals(“BIA”) both determined that Ricardo’s and Berta’s monetary assistance amounted to “alien smuggling” pursuant to section 212(a)(6)(E) of the INA, and that they thus lacked the “good moral character” necessary for cancellation of removal. Because the IJ and BIA properly interpreted and applied the”alien smuggling” provision, we deny the petition for review